


what a heavenly way to die

by lucastown



Category: the book thief
Genre: Angst, F/M, The Book Thief - Freeform, i love rudy steiner so much, i’m still mad, lowercase intended, my babies deserved endgame
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-19
Updated: 2019-08-19
Packaged: 2020-09-07 10:56:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,854
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20308336
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lucastown/pseuds/lucastown
Summary: “forever is in your eyes,but forever ain’t half the timei wanna spend with you.”





	what a heavenly way to die

**Author's Note:**

> we all knew i'd write about these two eventually. i just love them so freaking much okay. i'm sorry if this one hurts i definitely cried while writing it. i read a fanfic like this so creds to whoever wrote that!!

" cause forever is in your eyes  
but forever ain't half the time  
i wanna spend with you." 

" one day liesel, you'll be dying to kiss me." 

and that was true. the words a small blond boy had uttered to his glorious next-door neighbor on a sunny morning when the sweat from racing had tripped down their faces watering the earth below them, they were true.

she would one day be dying to kiss his lips and he one day, would die without knowing how her soft pink lips felt pressed against his own. 

no, rudy steiner would never get that kiss he had so longed for. 

no matter how much the girl chastised herself for her mistake, she couldn't undo what had already been done. she should've kissed him that night in his father's shop. 

it would have been so easy to press her lips to his when they leaned over the sketchbook that the man with the feathery had gifted to her. 

or when he had dove into the freezing river while the january winds bit as his nose just to retrieve her beloved book. 

god, she should've kissed him. 

and now, she couldn't. she never would be able to. 

•••

it happened all too fast for the young boy who lay with his little sister snuggled into him. 

one moment, he was breathing, sleeping, dreaming of the girl-next-door who had mesmerized him since the day they had met. 

the next moment, gone.

in a pile of ruble and smoke, all of rudy steiner's dreams had vanished along with his heartbeat. 

his electric eyes had shot open as soon as it had happened. 

as soon as the air had left his system and his heart and stopped beating, his eyes had shot open. 

he lay in the same position, his sister snuggled close, she too had snapped her own eyes open and was looking up at her big brother, asking him what had happened.

rudy couldn't answer her unasked question. his mind drew a blank to why on earth they were laying in a pile of ruble that looked as if it used to be their home. 

smoke was everywhere, the street that had once stood proudly was now reduced to a pile of ash. 

he heard his little sister cry out, possibly for their mother, really rudy had tuned her out. 

he heard people getting up, looking around in confusion as if they too had just been laying in bed fast asleep. 

nothing made sense. 

he turned to see rosa and hans hubermann getting up from the pile of what he could only assume had been their home. 

the boy's heart thudded, the brown eyed girl he adored so much had not made an appearance yet. he could only imagine the worst. 

he watched as hans helped his wife up. he could hear rosa cursing and he could see hans dust himself off. 

"where's liesel?" the older man asked, his eyes widening as he looked around for the young girl who had not made an appearance yet. 

rudy was asking the same question. his feet slid off the the bed, not even looking back at his mother was calling him. 

"liesel!" he heard rosa hubermann cry out,"saumensch!" 

rudy, like the hubermann's felt panic starting deep down in his gut. he let his feet move from the bed to the ash-covered grown. he stood, his eyes squinted as if that could possibly help him find the blonde. 

he watched her run out from the basement holding a book in her hands, tears ran down her face as she stared at her surroundings in disbelief. 

he felt himself let out a sigh of relief, there she was. she stood there in all of her glory, looking frantically around as if trying to piece everything together. 

"liesel!" he yelled out, unable to keep a wide grin off his face. when she said nothing back, he titled his head, maybe she hadn't heard him.

he called out her name once again. he watched her run right past her mama and papa who reached out to her.

"saumensch!" rosa called, her lips turned up in a smile of relief, "you're alright." 

she reached out to grab her daughter only to watch her run farther away, as if she hadn't seen or heard anything. 

rosa stared at her daughter's distraught face before turning to her husband. "what is wrong with her?" she asked him, her smile sinking downwards. 

hans stared at the young woman who ran frantically around, tears flooding her brown eyes. 

"liesel." he called out with the softness rudy has always heard him use. the softness liesel had described to be like warm cotton against her cold exterior. 

the blond boy watched hans reach out to her, but he too had no such luck in grabbing the girl's attention. 

rudy frowned, confusion washing over him in cold waves. 

he watched her let out a sob making his heart twist with a feeling he could not quite identify. all he knew was he did not like the sight of the girl dropping to her knees besides someone while she let out gut-wrenching cries. 

"liesel?" rudy tried again, taking careful steps closer to the crying girl. 

he kept getting closer and closer, pausing to look over his shoulder at hans and rosa who stared at the young boy, just as confused as he was. 

" .....wake up!" he heard, making his eyebrows furrow inwards. he could only make out parts of the words she yelled into the dusty air. 

" book thief?" he asked, trying to grab her attention with the silly nickname he had made up for her so long ago. 

"... kiss me!" she cried out. 

her words made rudy stumble backwards. his heart thumping loudly with an ache ringing in it. 

who was this? who was she talking to? liesel has never mentioned anyone other than max, and this person (whoever they were) looked far too small to be the adult whom liesel had spoken about. 

was this her boyfriend? 

rudy could not bear the very thought of her having a boyfriend. it made his stomach feel icky and his fists clench unconsciously. 

"... i love you!" she screamed at the person who looked to be laying down. 

rudy felt his face grow a hot red with anger he had not intended to feel. he couldn't help it, she had rejected every single thing he had said to her growing up, but recently, it seemed like things had changed. 

well, it had certainly changed for him. 

without realizing it, his feelings in the passing months had changed. somehow, without his own knowledge, his feelings had somehow started to mature. 

new feelings ran through his veins, they drove him to make mistakes that he usually wouldn't make. 

it was impossible to get the blonde girl out of his mind, even in sleep he could not get away from the spell she had cast upon him. 

it was foolish, but he felt himself believing that maybe, just maybe, she was beginning to feel the same. 

as he watched her lean over a boy telling him how much she loved him, the horrifying truth was brought to life, she didn't feel the same. 

rudy watched her kneel over the boy, lucky bastard, he thought. 

he had to see who the boy was, he felt his feet moving closer and closer to the blonde girl who was still kneeling. 

rudy was finally close enough to see who liesel was screaming at and why exactly they weren't jumping up and screaming that they loved the blonde girl back, which was something rudy would've done if he were the damned boy. 

he moved his head so he could see the boy's face. 

his feet stumbled backwards as his eyes widened in disbelief. 

no, it wasn't possible. 

rudy stared at the young boy who lay on the ground. 

it was him. 

he shook his head, nothing made sense. how could he be laying down in the pile of ruble but still be standing over liesel? 

" don't you know i love you, " she cried out making rudy's eyes grow, somehow, wider. 

why wasn't he jumping up? why wasn't he telling her he loved her too? 

he still didn't understand, what was happening? why was he in two places at once, why couldn't she see him? why couldn't she hear him? 

" liesel," he said softly, "i love you too." he wanted to scream out, why couldn't she hear him? 

desperate for her to answer, desperate for her to turn around and embrace him. desperate for something. 

"liesel!" he cried out, frustration throbbing everywhere. he reached out for her, trying to place a hand on her shoulder. 

he was desperate to just touch her. 

but his hand, placed on her shoulder, had no affect on her. it was like, he wasn't even there. 

rudy could feel tears welling up in his blue eyes. his hands began shaking, tears rolling down his pale cheeks.

"liesel!" he cried again. 

" .... wake up!" she sobbed and finally, rudy could get a better look at the version of him she was screaming at. 

his once ivory cheeks were a ghostly white, dirt caked around his face, and his once pink lips were a nauseating blue, but his hair, oh his candlelit hair, it still burned bright. even in the dark smoke that rudy has just come to realize surrounded him. 

in one moment, his jaw dropped, his eyes widened, and his free hand came up to his mouth as he held back a gasp. 

"no, no, no!" he screamed, stumbling backwards. his hands came up to his hair, pulling at strands. 

it couldn't be. 

he looked around, he could see bodies everywhere. his upper lip trembled. 

"no!" he cried again as he watched liesel. she continued to shake him, no, his body. 

he felt himself collapse next to liesel. his knees tucking inwards as his hands shook coming up to touch his face. 

he watched her shake before pressing her arms down to the sides of him. even in his shocked state, he stopped to watch her. she let out a small cry before leaning forwards. 

she, liesel meminger, pressed a kiss to what once were his lips. 

he felt his gut (or what should've been his gut) twist in a painfully beautiful way. 

it was something he had longed for his entire life, but it wasn't supposed to be like this. 

he could feel a breeze against his lips as if she was actually kissing him. 

her lips (or whatever it was he felt pressed upon his own) were warm like vanilla he could even taste a hint of cigarette under layers of dirt. 

he felt himself smile even though tears continued to pour down his cheeks. 

every thing else stopped, he watched her pull away, he could only feel a type of bliss overwhelm him despite having felt a tidal wave of emotions him only moments before. 

if this was how he was supposed to die, then at least he died with her lips on his. 

what a heavenly way to die.

**Author's Note:**

> yikes that made little to no sense whatsoever lmao. uh also what a heavenly way to die is by troye sivan soooo yeah check it out it's an amazing song. 
> 
> i love rudy and liesel so much ugh my babies deserved endgame.


End file.
